


The Lover After Me

by Nina_Dances_In_Technicolor (orphan_account)



Series: Three's Company [1]
Category: Adam Lambert (Musician)
Genre: Dom/sub, M/M, Multi, Power Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-29
Updated: 2012-10-29
Packaged: 2017-11-17 06:51:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/548790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Nina_Dances_In_Technicolor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Adam needs to give in, let go, give it all up. Sometimes Sauli wishes he could be better at helping with that. And sometimes, Brad bridges the gaps.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lover After Me

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for glam_kink, for the prompt "face slapping during a D/s scene." This is set in its own little untitled 'verse where a very vanilla Sauli appeals to Brad, Adam's former Dom, for help.
> 
> First fic in this series.

"I do not want to make him ashamed of something that is innocent."  
  
"I don't either." Brad glances across the table, then down at the little plate of Finnish dessert he's been served, ice cream and baked apples, and feels vaguely homesick. Their conversation didn't start out this way; it started out as an amicable argument over whether the dish is Finnish or Southern, with Brad pointing out that in Texas, stewed apples not so different from what's in front of him are a breakfast food.   
  
Then it got serious. Brad knew it would, but it doesn't stop the steel wire of nerves pinging through his stomach. He nibbles an apple.  
  
"Having second thoughts?"  
  
"No," Sauli answers. "No. If it is necessary. I understand. But we do not take this away from him, yes? It is a thing he is proud of."  
  
"I know." Brad nibbles at his ice cream. "Say it again, would you?"  
  
"Vihreä, keltainen, punainen," Sauli recites. Brad swallows his spoonful and rolls his eyes.  
  
"I'm surprised Finns ever get _anything_ done with how long it takes you to say things," Brad comments. "You get how this works?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Pass me the jewel case," Brad says, and takes it from Sauli's hand. He sets it by his saucer. "And your ring."  
  
Sauli's eyes grow dark. "That I will not give you. It is not yours to take off."  
  
Brad gives him a withering look. "I'm not _taking_ it. I'm–" He pauses and pulls a chain over his head. "Just put it on here and wear it around your neck, then. Or move it to your left hand, that works too."  
  
Sauli tries to stare him down. Brad stares back, and finally Sauli looks down, moves his ring from one hand to the other. Brad watches the way he touches it, an almost unconscious caress along its edge as he slides it onto his left hand, and doesn't smile. He likes seeing it–they'll need that closeness, Sauli and Adam together and Adam on his own–but now isn't the time to say so.  
  
There's a sudden roar from outside. Sauli winces.  
  
"He has taken the turn too slowly again."   
  
Brad opens his eyes wider, alarmed. "Is he going to make it?"  
  
"He will make it, but it is very bad for the, you know–" Sauli gestures vaguely with his hands. "I do not know how you say in English. When you stamp—so!—on your gas pedal, and the engine makes these noises—" He imitates the cough of a dying engine surprisingly well.  
  
"It can flood the motor," Brad fills in. "I don't remember what you call the actual part, but I know what you mean."  
  
"That is what you call it, to flood the motor?"  
  
Brad hums his assent. "Adam probably knows the real name for it. I pay a mechanic to know it for me."  
  
Sauli laughs. Then the front door opens, and he goes suddenly still and turns in the direction of the front hall. Brad watches him, fascinated; it's like watching a living statue. Adam wanders into the kitchen and throws his keys on the table.  
  
"I killed the fucking carburetor again," Adam grouses, getting a glass of water. Sauli brightens.  
  
"That is what you call it, a carburetor!"  
  
Adam's eyes flick from Sauli to Brad. "Hey, baby, you didn't tell me we were having company."  
  
The wire in Brad's stomach turns, then snaps. It's like being back onstage in sixth grade, except in sixth grade he was wearing a pair of bright red pantaloons and rainbow suspenders and being terrified because his mom and teachers and principal and fellow castmates and probably a few holy beings would _kill_ him if he popped a boner while playing Jesus, and now he's wearing jean shorts and a T-shirt and he has no audience, so it's not the same at all, actually, except for the part where a little voice in his head is yelling _Bradley, you're on!_  
  
"You would've known if you'd actually picked up your phone instead of ignoring it and coming home two hours late," Brad comments. This is a lie; Adam is always home around six unless he says otherwise, and the text in Brad's phone that says four o'clock—the one Adam sent at four-thirty—doesn't change a whole lot. This is the stage-dressing, if you will.  
  
"I—" Adam bites his lip. Sauli's eyes flicker back and forth between them. Brad raises an eyebrow. On any other night Adam would flop down into one of the other chairs at the table, but tonight he just stands, the three of them having a silent conversation with their eyes.  
  
"This, "Brad says, finally. He taps the edge of the jewel case on the table, hoping it doesn't scratch what's inside. This is why he got a copy today at Wal-Mart instead of risking the one he has on a shelf at home, but he'd really like to be able to give it away instead of having to throw it out. "What the fuck was _this_ , Adam?"  
  
Adam blinks at him. Brad can feel Sauli's gaze, searching him carefully, and keeps his eyes on Adam's face. "What are you talking about?"  
  
Brad flips open the case, pulls out the booklet inside. " _This_ is what I'm here for." He stands up. "Brad," he reads. "I'll always remember my first love. Thanks for showing me the way." He flips the booklet onto the table, trying to keep it out of his and Sauli's dishes without looking. "Your _first love_ , Adam? Really?"  
  
"I thought you'd be okay with it!" Adam protests. "It's not like I have all your contact information in there or something!"  
  
"You didn't _ask_ anybody. Figured you'd rather beg forgiveness than permission?" Brad cocks a hip, sets a pose. Adam shrinks back.  
  
"I talked to Sauli."  
  
"No," Sauli contradicts, from his place in his chair. "You simply called me one day from the studio and told me that you wanted to include him in your thanks, as your lover. There was no discussion, Adam, only what you call a heads-up."  
  
"Yeah, but—!"  
  
That's when Brad hits him, an openhanded slap across his face that leaves his cheek red and his head turned to the side. Adam tilts his face up to an angle where he can look down at Brad, and Brad does it again—hard, careful to keep his hand travelling on a straight angle where it will not touch bone, will turn Adam's face to the side before Brad can connect with his nose. Then he reverses direction, a neat backhand that leaves his fingers moist where Adam's lips went loose with painshock. Adam's mouth opens, but nothing comes out.  
  
"Just shut the fuck up for once, Adam," Brad chides. "You spent enough of the last week running your mouth putting that thank-you page out there, we don't need to hear any more."  
  
Adam gives him a bare nod. Brad turns to Sauli. "Anything to add?"  
  
At first he thinks Sauli isn't even going to get out of his seat; he's nibbling at his bottom lip, watching them nervously like this is an actual fight, which is kind of hilarious, actually, because if Brad had ever tried to slap Adam in an actual fight he would've lost—or possibly broken Adam's nose. There's a serious art to slapping someone the right way.  
  
Then Sauli pushes himself out of his chair, and Brad forgets thoughts of fistfights and old arguments in favour of watching Sauli's eyes. He's the one Brad's really concerned about; Adam, after all, is an old hand at this.  
  
"You tell me I am your light, your love, your only, but then you cannot even say what you mean in print?" he asks. Brad watches Sauli put his hands on Adam's shoulders and give him a shake. "You must hide behind misspellings that are so easy to prevent, you have seen me write them for you a thousand times, so that later if someone unravels the secret you can call it a joke?"  
  
"I was trying to give us some privacy," Adam answers, and Brad sees Sauli glance at his bare right hand for just a moment— _you get it now,_ Brad thinks—before pulling his arm back and swinging.  
  
He's trembling a little, and he's no professional at this, but his aim is relatively straight and what he lacks in precision he makes up for with a lighter touch than Brad has. Brad notes with approval the red mark on Adam's cheek, nowhere near the delicate cheekbone that's so easy to bruise. Adam takes a step back. Brad waits a moment for Sauli to pursue, or maybe to answer Adam's comment or reprimand him, but when nothing is forthcoming—Sauli is either frozen or doesn't remember how to continue—Brad makes a noise deep in his throat. Sauli turns toward him.  
  
"You know, I bet I know why he did it," Brad comments. Sauli glances at him. "You know what 'being easy' is, right?"  
  
Brad doesn't need to hear Sauli's "I do" to know it's coming; "I'm easy, not a whore" is a joke Adam makes a lot, and Brad has the feeling it's probably one of the first idioms Sauli learned. Brad turns his eyes from Sauli to Adam.  
  
"So now the question is, what are you going to do to fix it?" he asks. Adam opens his mouth again and looks like he's thinking. Brad knows he's not—he expects to be told. Even if he comes up with an idea, Brad and Sauli will shoot it down. Brad cocks his head at Adam's expression.  
  
"Good enough," he says, and when Adam looks up at him Brad nods at his parted lips. "For now. Get on your knees."  
  
Sauli turns to Brad and mouths a question: _right here?_ Brad raises an eyebrow and shrugs: _does it matter?_ Sauli bites his lip. Then he reaches for his fly—Brad really needs to do something about teaching that boy how to use a belt the right way—and unzips. Brad reaches for his free hand and pulls it behind his back: _Make Adam do the work._ There's a pause, and then Sauli touches Brad's wrist with his other hand, putting them both behind his back.  
  
There's a clink of metal as Sauli's jeans hit the floor. Brad kisses his cheek gently, just a touch to get his attention.  
  
"Okay?" he whispers into Sauli's ear. Sauli nods, finds Brad's fingers behind his back, squeezes them. Then he gasps. Brad peeks around his shoulder and grins, hiding the expression carefully behind Sauli's arm in case Adam happens to look up.   
  
Giving head is one of those things Brad has never been able to understand about Adam—yes, it's a great way to make any given partner go absolutely insane, and Adam has this _ridiculous_ level of control over his gag reflex that puts people right through the roof, but Brad's never understood exactly what it is about the act itself that gets Adam going. If sometime before Idol someone had offered Adam a thousand a pop to suck cock, Brad's pretty sure Adam would have cheerfully made it his career.  
  
And, Brad thinks, watching Adam's head bob back and forth, he probably would have ended up the richest fucking escort in Hollywood, even with loyalty discounts.  
  
Brad waits until he hears Sauli's breathing change. Then he puts a single bare foot on Adam's shoulder and pushes him backward. "I think you're starting to like this too much."  
  
Adam sits back on his heels and bows his head. Brad wants to give Sauli a push, or a nudge, or an elbow to the small of his back, anything to make him remember it's his play, but before he can Sauli grabs his jeans and slides Brad's borrowed belt through the loops. Brad nods with approval at the way he handles it, looping it over and tapping it once against his hand to test its swing before—turning and handing it to Brad.  
  
Brad wants to push it back into his hand. Instead he takes a closer look at Sauli's eyes, and as he circles around behind Adam he murmurs "getting better, sugar" into Sauli's ear. Then he orders Adam onto hands and knees and nods at a chair.  
  
"Want a seat?" he asks, and looks down at Adam's back. "We're gonna be here awhile."  
  
Sauli glances around, reaches for Brad's vacated chair and perches on the edge. Brad considers; thirty is the number they agreed on, but thirty is also the number they agreed on when the belt was supposed to be in Sauli's hands, where Brad assumed at least a third of the swings would either miss or be too light.   
  
"I hope they have some _really_ comfy chairs at those interviews you have coming up, bitch," Brad says. "Because if they don't, you're gonna have to come up with some _really_ creative reasons why you're standing up."  
  
He lets the belt fly, a short swing that whistles before the round loop of the belt connects squarely with Adam's ass. Adam lets out a smothered sound. Brad blinks in surprise Adam can't see when Sauli tips Adam's head up with his left hand, right one raised threateningly. His fingers are splayed a little, and Brad makes a mental note to correct it later; right now, he's too pleased Sauli's taking the initiative.  
  
"Did Bradley not tell you to _shut up_?" he asks. Brad punctuates the sentence neatly for him with another swing of the belt. This time Adam tenses, but no sound comes out, and Sauli lowers his hand. Brad lets the loop of the belt linger just below the small of Adam's back, a light leather touch reminding Adam that this is only a momentary respite.  
  
"I think fourteen," he says. "Lucky seven for both of us." And he swings again, neatly overlapping his most recent strike to raise a bright red welt.  
  
Four lashes later he looks up at Sauli and almost drops the belt. Sauli is sitting with his hands clasped tightly between his knees, eyes squeezed shut. Brad takes a step to the left and leans to touch Sauli's shoulder. Sauli looks up at him. Brad points at Sauli's face, then forks his fingers at his own: _just look at me._ Sauli nods once. Brad watches his shoulders tense as Brad swings again, but doesn't stop. _Virus killed puma,_ he repeats to himself—the mnemonic he created to remember the first sounds in the Finnish _green, yellow, red_.   
  
Brad glances down at Adam, swaying on his hands and knees, and considers pulling Adam's head back by his hair to see how he's doing. He promptly rejects the idea—one time when Adam was in headspace Brad twisted him neatly up into a pretzel just for the fun of the thing and then jerked him off, but that was a lazy, loving scene on a pair of mattresses pushed together on the floor where Adam could topple off to the side without getting hurt if he had to, and Brad refuses to be responsible for the kinds of things that could happen if Adam's back bows and he falls on a hard stone tile floor.   
  
Instead he goes down on one knee and lifts Adam's head, nudging Sauli's calf with his elbow as he does, displaying Adam's face for Sauli's perusal. His pupils are wide—he looks, Brad thinks, kind of like he's been dropping downers—and his lips are shiny where he's still trying to lick off the last of the precome Brad couldn't keep him away from, but the rest of his face is as slack and dreaming as if they'd interrupted him sleeping. Brad lowers his head again, careful not to let it just jerk down, and squeezes the back of Adam's neck gently, feeling the tendons there. He doesn't get any sense that Adam's blown out early, no feeling that Adam needs one of them to call it quits for him, and so he gets back to his feet. "Halfway through," he declares. "Seven more, bitch." He holds the belt out to Sauli, but it's only a formality—he already knows he has to finish himself.  
  
The second half goes faster—swing and lash and the flat of his foot gently against Adam's hip to steady Adam when he sways in obedient silence, the faint ache of too long ago in Brad's shoulder and a reprimand Adam probably doesn't even hear about not coming. Then Brad declares "Fourteen," and drops the belt on the floor.   
  
There's a moment of silence, broken only by the hum of the refrigerator and Adam's panting. Then Brad gets back to one knee and puts a hand on Adam's back. "Good job, baby," he praises, and strokes Adam's back, one long caress from neck to tailbone along the spine. "Can you sit back?"  
  
Adam rests on his haunches. Then he makes a face and shifts around, trying to find a place on his rear that Brad didn't mark. _Good luck with that_ , Brad thinks, and glances up at Sauli. Then he strokes Adam's back again. "Want to go get cleaned up?"  
  
Adam nods. Brad helps him first to one knee and then slowly to his feet, mindful of the sore places and checking that Adam's steady before letting go. "We'll see you in a couple of minutes," Brad promises, and kisses his cheek. "Don't fall asleep in the shower this time."  
  
Adam nods and offers up a hesitant smile. Brad returns it, and Adam's smile deepens before he shambles out to go lay on the floor of the shower and get pelted with water. This is another thing Brad's never understood about him—Brad likes to be spoilt after a scene, petted and cared for and washed gently clean, and the idea of having to do it himself is enough to freak him out a little—but Adam seems to enjoy it, even to prefer it. He muses for a second on why anybody would want to be alone after a spanking, and then he turns back to Sauli.  
  
"Why didn't you safe out?"  
  
Sauli looks up from his hands, startled. "Ah?"  
  
"Your safe," Brad repeats. "Pumanen, or however it is you say it—I would've known it if I'd heard it. Why didn't you use it?"  
  
"It is 'punainen'," Sauli answers. "And I did not see a need to use it."  
  
"You started out doing great," Brad tells him. "Showing him you'd slap him again if he didn't listen, that was brilliant. But then the next time I looked at you everything was Section Eight, and you didn't say anything."  
  
Sauli blushes, but under the blush there's a puzzled expression. Brad replays what he just said. _Oh._  
  
"I mean the next time I looked up you were right off the rai–" He sticks his tongue out between his teeth and bites it. "It wasn't working for you. You were upset."  
  
"I know what it is to be 'off the rails'," Sauli scolds. "It is something Neil says. And I was not off the rails."  
  
"So you were sitting there looking ready to start screaming, just for the fun of it?" Brad asks. He folds his arms. Sauli looks down at his hands.  
  
"I did not want to send Adam away that way. I will not see him again for a month."  
  
"If every scene is going to be me worrying about you worrying about Adam, I can't teach you anymore," Brad says. "What you're trying to do isn't healthy for you and in the end it's not going to be healthy for him, either."  
  
"He is like a doll, you understand?" Sauli spits out. "When he sits and he says nothing, and you hit him and say these horrible things to him and he does not make a single sound, that is not the Adam I know. His face is like a different person."  
  
Brad thinks about the first time he ever watched Adam go deep, the fear he felt when Adam's usually expressive face went blank and still, and he puts his hands on Sauli's shoulders. "He's never really explained what headspace is to you, has he?"  
  
"He has tried." Sauli looks off at the glass of the patio door. Brad has a fleeting moment to think how cool it is that a paper-thin film on the inside lets them see out but turns the outside into a mirror, and then he touches Sauli's face to get his attention back. "I do not understand."  
  
"Do you not understand because he doesn't have words for it, or do you 'not understand' because whenever there's something you don't want to hear you pretend you're not nearly as fluent in English as you actually are?"  
  
Sauli's mouth falls open. Brad watches a fresh flush of colour douse his cheeks. "I do not—"  
  
"I told you when you asked me to help you that we couldn't do this if we couldn't be honest with each other," Brad chides. Sauli looks down and bites at his lip again.  
  
"Both, a little," he says. "Even when he began he told me it is very hard to describe. He said it was like his thoughts were someone moving in deep water."  
  
"Maybe _you_ need a Dom," Brad suggests. "That's how I got started as a top. I couldn't do it until I knew what it was like from the other side." There's a lot of subtext in there he hopes Sauli can't find—like the three agonizing months when he and Adam almost broke up over their sex life, the season before Brad finally spilled all his secrets like an overstressed dam and Adam stroked his hair and kissed him and put a whip in his hand—but if he does, they'll have to talk through it. He can't send Sauli to bed this way.  
  
"That is an easy suggestion for someone who is not famous," Sauli lobs back. "You know I will not do anything that would hurt Adam. Tabloid pictures, they are not the worst in Finland, but in America there is no such thing as privacy for the celebrity."  
  
"I know." _Don't do it,_ Brad's inner stagehand warns. _Don't even think about it._ "We can talk about it tomorrow after Adam leaves," he suggests. "You've only got a few hours left with him, you should make the most of it."  
  
Sauli nods abruptly. "He will be in the shower?"  
  
"And probably half-asleep by now," Brad agrees. "What are you going to do when you get in there?"  
  
Sauli tilts his head to the side. Brad fights the urge to roll his eyes; the only thing more amazing than Sauli's usual inventive brilliance is how damned _slow_ he can be sometimes.  
  
"He just got whipped with a belt and called a slut, and he's going through his downtime right now," Brad explains. "What happens next is an important part of the scene even though the scene is already over, so what are you going to do?"  
  
"I—" Sauli nibbles his lip. "I do not know."  
  
"Talk it out."  
  
Sauli considers. "Water?"  
  
"And?"  
  
"And . . . and I will kiss him, and thank him for trusting me, and ask how he is feeling," Sauli suggests.  
  
"Good one," Brad agrees. "What else?"  
  
Sauli makes a face. "Then we will talk, what else is there?"  
  
"Don't you think somebody who just picked up a nice little nest of bruises might want some, I don't know, _Advil_?"  
  
Brad watches a whole host of things fly across Sauli's face before clicking together, and he catches Sauli's arm before he can run out of the room to get started on Adam's aftercare.  
  
"And next time," he warns, " _safe out_ if you need to."  
  
"Tomorrow," Sauli says. "We will not talk before then." Then he kisses Brad's cheek. "There are fresh towels in the hall bathroom," he says. "I put them there this morning. And then, maybe, you will join us?"  
  
"I'll stay with you, but I'm not sleeping in your bed." Something in him tells him it's already too late for those kinds of formalities, but Brad is good at pretending. Sauli shrugs.  
  
"There is, under the bench in our room, Adam calls it a daybed," he suggests. "I have slept there when Riff is napping. It is comfortable."  
  
Brad considers. He was going to demand the couch, but either of them might need him in the night, and it meets the only requirement he put forward.  
  
"All right," he agrees. "I'll be back in a couple of minutes."  
  
Brad washes quickly, but Adam is still deeply asleep when he gets into the bedroom. Sauli sits on the side of the bed, stroking his hair.  
  
"He worried about me also," Sauli says. "I told him that this, it is a thing that you must accustom yourself to, and that I love him."  
  
Brad nods. "How was he feeling?"  
  
The corners of Sauli's mouth quirk up. "He told me that I hit like a girl."  
  
Brad claps a hand over his mouth to stop a loud spray of laughter. Sauli's face breaks into a grin. "I do not think it was a compliment."  
  
Brad shakes his head and holds his hand out in a warding-off gesture: _stop, I can't._ Sauli's grin holds, then fades into a smile. Brad watches him go back to stroking Adam's hair and shoulders, and his laughter peters out.  
  
"This is probably going to sound horrible," he says. "I wouldn't change that we broke up. I think we needed to. But I'm still jealous of you."  
  
Sauli looks up from Adam's sleeping face. "It is not horrible," he comments. "Not unless I am also horrible for being jealous of you."  
  
Brad stares. " _Why?_ "  
  
"Because you are able to give him a thing he needs, and I am not." He raises Adam's hand to his face and rubs his cheek against it. "Because you knew him before he was famous, and I did not, and so you can say you love him and nobody questions you." He meets Brad's gaze with a steel Brad takes careful note of: this is a Sauli he wants to be able to use when Adam gets back from his promo tour. "I would like to be able to say that I do not care for his money or his fame, or even his talent, although it is very wonderful. It is his heart that I love, but many people do not believe that. And as long as they believe that he is stupid enough to be fooled by a, how is it you say—the young woman who marries the rich old man so that when he dies she will get all his money? It is not a gold-grabber . . . "  
  
"Golddigger," Brad supplies automatically. "But people use 'money-grabber,' too."  
  
"Yes," Sauli agrees. "A gold-digger. As long as there are people who believe Adam is so stupid to be fooled by one, they are harming him. You do not even accept his gas-money when we drive together. I live with him. It is not so easy as it was for you."  
  
Brad feels a humourless smile on his mouth. "I understand." He lets the smile relax into something gentler. "That's what this is about. Giving him a space to sort out the people who matter from the irrelevant bullshit." He waits for Sauli's nod before he continues. "And for what it's worth—he knows you for what you really are, and so do I. You wouldn't have fought so hard to be with him if it was just the money. There are plenty of millionaires in Europe." He reaches a hand out from the daybed, and after a minute, Sauli takes it. "I was worried when I first met you. I'm not anymore."  
  
Sauli squeezes Brad's hand. On the big bed, Adam makes a sleeping sound and rolls over. Sauli finds Adam's hand and laces their fingers together. Brad slides his hand carefully out of Sauli's.  
  
"How's his face?"  
  
"I did not see swelling."  
  
"Bruises?"  
  
"Very small, here." Sauli touches the corner of his jaw. "The size of my fingertip. It will be hidden as soon as he puts on his day makeup and I do not think it will last longer than a day."  
  
"Good." Brad slides his legs under the coverlet on the daybed. "You should get some sleep. He has to be up early. And if you want to spend any time alone together tomorrow, I should split by eight."  
  
Sauli nods. There's a pause. "Thank you," he says at last. "For helping us."  
  
 _Don't say it!_ Brad's inner voice yells. For once, he ignores it.  
  
"Anytime."


End file.
